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All across the country, Canadians are making extraordinary sacrifices to safeguard the health of their neighbours. My First Nation is doing our part, even while a flood has dislocated Mikisew members and damaged our infrastructure.

Why do we do these things? It is engrained in us as Canadians — and additionally so as Indigenous Canadians — that we protect our people and our cherished places.

The Athabasca River and Wood Buffalo National Park in northern Alberta are two cherished places that are key to Mikisew’s cultural survival. Both engage federal jurisdiction in many ways, such as public navigation, fish and wildlife habitat, migratory birds, species at risk and Treaty rights. Wood Buffalo National Park holds unique national importance, as Canada’s largest national park and a place where a history of inadequate monitoring and environmental protection is a major challenge to Canada’s international standing as an environmental leader.

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Unfortunately, during this time of crisis, actions are being taken in Alberta that falsely pit protection of people against the protection of these places. The result is that areas of federal jurisdiction — including Canada’s most at-risk World Heritage Site, according to the International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN) — are being put at needless risk.

I’m referring to recent actions to curtail oilsands environmental monitoring at a time when repeated evaluations have unanimously concluded that the health of the Peace-Athabasca Delta is deteriorating. Recently, Alberta and its energy regulator drastically reduced monitoring of migratory birds (despite birds dying recently in tailings ponds).

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Monitoring of species at risk under the Species at Risk Act is also now curtailed. These reductions extend to environmental parameters that Canada’s own agencies have identified as pathways contributing to the negative trends with that park. And this is all happening after the IUCN rated Wood Buffalo National Park as having the worst conservation outlook of all of Canada’s World Heritage sites.

Environmental monitoring is not simply a cost imposed on industry; it is a key mechanism to protect the environment and the health of communities.

Canada must closely scrutinize these actions because many national interests, like the already declining health of Wood Buffalo National Park, are jeopardized. The logic behind the actions doesn’t add up. Halting the use of remote monitoring equipment doesn’t protect health. And monitoring is even more critical to protecting human health when companies reduce personnel and alter operations at facilities in response to the COVID-19 crisis, increasing the potential for incidents. If the underlying intention is to limit non-essential travel in our region (a concern we share), why not hire locally, creating a win for employment and the environment?

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The timing of Alberta’s actions for Canada couldn’t be worse, as it is coming on the heels of recent reports by UNESCO, Parks Canada and the IUCN that all recommend more monitoring, not less, because of the deteriorating condition of Wood Buffalo National Park.

Canada is due to report to UNESCO shortly on how it is fixing the deterioration of the park and deficient monitoring systems, is working on regulations to allow the release of oilsands effluent into the Athabasca River, and is a key partner in the Oil Sands Monitoring Program. All these initiatives are compromised by the reductions in oilsands monitoring and reporting requested by, and granted to, industry.

We strongly urge Canada to use tools at its disposal to address the new monitoring and reporting gaps in the oilsands region that threaten our people and Wood Buffalo National Park.

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